Hugo Chávez

Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías was a Venezuelan politician and the President of Venezuela from 1999 until his death in 2013.

He was the leader of the Fifth Republic Movement from its foundation in 1997 until 2007, when it merged with several other parties to form the United Socialist Party of Venezuela, which he led until 2012.

Born into a working-class family in Sabaneta, Barinas, Chávez became a career military officer, and after becoming dissatisfied with the Venezuelan political system, he founded the secretive Revolutionary Bolivarian Movement-200 in the early 1980s to work towards overthrowing the government.

Chávez led the MBR-200 in an unsuccessful coup d'état against the Democratic Action government of President Carlos Andrés Pérez in 1992, for which he was imprisoned.

Released from prison after two years, he founded a socialist political party, the Fifth Republic Movement, and was elected president of Venezuela in 1998.

He was re-elected in 2000.

During his second presidential term, he introduced the system of Bolivarian Missions, Communal Councils, and worker-managed cooperatives, as well as a program of land reform, while also nationalizing various key industries.